4 THE PRACTICAL ANGLER 



superfluity of that institution of the country, pale 

 ale. 



" Though sluggards deem it but an idle chase, 

 And marvel men should quit their easy chair, 

 The toilsome way and long long league to trace ; 

 Oh ! there is sweetness in the mountain air, 

 And life that bloated ease can never hope to share." 



That angling is good for exercise is certain. That 

 it is also good for amusement is equally certain ; but 

 the pleasure derived from the catching of fish, like 

 that derived from other field sports, is more easily 

 felt than described. There can be no doubt, that by 

 the great majority of people an amusement is valued 

 in proportion as it affords room for the exercise of 

 skill there is more merit, and therefore more 

 pleasure, in excelling in what is difficult and though 

 we may astonish some of our readers, we assert, and 

 shall endeavour to prove, that angling is the most 

 difficult of all field sports. It requires all the manual 

 dexterity that the others do, and brings more into 

 play the qualities of the mind, observation, and the 

 reasoning faculties. In shooting and hunting, the 

 dogs do the observation and the reasoning part of 

 the business, and the sportsmen the mechanical ; but 

 the angler has not only to find out where his fish are 

 but to catch them, and that not by such a " knock- 

 me-down " method as is practised upon some unfor- 

 tunate blackcock or unwary hare, but by an art of 

 deception. The angler's wits, in fact, are brought 

 into direct competition with those of the fish, which 

 very often, judging from the result, prove the better 

 of the two. 



